


love your enemy (or, Innocent)

by ginexvra



Series: the art of war (and love) [6]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: EDELGARD ANGST AND LOTS OF IT, F/M, Hope that's cool, SPOILERS THOUGH MASSIVE SPOILERS, claude and byleth talk about edelgard before the war, claude has a nickname for her too, i figured out some things edelgard did, i use my own byleth's name, it made me really sad and angry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-28 08:34:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20775626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ginexvra/pseuds/ginexvra
Summary: “I respected her as the future leader of the Empire, but also as a girl who always just wanted to do right by her friends. All the times we spoke in the hallways,  had tea, shared meals...now I feel like perhaps I had things all wrong. I don’t know what feels worse: that Edelgard is a liar or that I had been a fool to believe her.”-------(or, Byleth realises how far Edelgard had been willing to go to get what she wanted even before the war started - and how Claude had nearly died for it.)****MASSIVE EDELGARD SPOILERS. DO NOT OPEN unless you've passed your timeskips. You've been warned.****





	love your enemy (or, Innocent)

**Author's Note:**

> If you're here, I'm assuming you've been warned, so: I had this idea after rewatching the GD playthrough and realising there had been a conversation between Kostas the bandit and the Flame Emperor, about how Kostas had been sent to attack the Academy students outside Remire Village. [upside-down smileys] And I went BANANAS. 
> 
> Angst ensued.

These days, Claude is so on edge that the quiet taps on his door rouse him as quickly as if they were cannonfire. In three long strides he’s at the door, opening it just the tiniest crack. 

“Teach?”

Gloriana is standing outside his doorway, dressed in only her nightgown with her dark coat thrown over it. Claude could almost imagine that he’s having a very good dream, if it weren’t for the troubled expression on her face. 

“I’m sorry for coming up here so late, but there’s something I need to talk to you about.” No, definitely not a good dream. “I was going to wait until morning, but then I realised even if I waited we might not have a chance.” She gestures to the hallway with her hand. “Do you mind?”

Sleep was soft and his bed was warm, but he shoves his feet into his shoes and follows her outside.

* * *

Gloriana stops at the edge of the terrace. From here, they can see the villages of Garreg Mach sprawl across the countryside for miles ahead. The cold wind whips between them, and she wraps her arms around her chest. “Do you remember the night we met, in Remire Village?”

“As if I could forget.” He says it with only the barest hint of levity; he can tell she won’t be leading up to a romantic reminiscence of their relationship’s illustrious beginning. “What about it, Teach?”

“A knight who interrogated that bandit leader, Kostas, spoke to me today. He's the thug whom I saved Edelgard from.”

Claude can’t hold back a scoff. “Wow. I almost forgot that happened. Can you imagine how much trouble it would have saved us all if you hadn’t?” 

“No, see - that’s the thing,” Gloriana unwinds her arms from around herself, hands curling into fists on the parapet. “Kostas was there by the Flame Emperor’s order. The Flame Emperor ordered him to ‘kill as many noble pipsqueaks as possible’ in the camp outside of Remire.”

She turns to him, anguish in her pale eyes. “Claude. It was _ Edelgard _ who ordered him to _ kill you. _”

The words drop in the space between them, but Claude’s brain refuses to pick up on their meaning. For a long moment, there’s only the sound of the cicadas singing in the gardens below, the chill of the wind that he uses as an excuse for why the hair on his arms is suddenly standing on end, Gloriana’s unblinking green stare. Anything, anything he can hold onto to stretch out this moment so he can prolong accepting the one that comes next.

It’s several, endless seconds before he allows the shock of the news to finally hit him. “Edelgard. Ordered my death. And Dima’s.” His voice is hollow.

“All those times that she would make jabs about defeating you or Dimitri in battle, I thought that it was just the rivalry that comes with the sport. Yet she made it through the school year knowing that she had already tried to order your deaths before it even started.”

“Have you told him?”

She shakes her head no. “I told Hanneman. He can decide if it’s prudent to tell Dimitri. Lately, Dimitri - ”

“ - has been off his rocker?”

“ - hasn’t been himself,” Gloriana corrects. “He’s been calling for Edelgard’s head and praying in the cathedral at odd hours of the day. Telling him Edelgard tried to have him assassinated might lead him to do something very stupid.”

_Assassinated. _ Claude tries to make sense of the facts. He has political ambitions, Edelgard does too. He’s not above manipulation to get those ambitions. Edelgard isn’t either. He tries to write this _ political move _ off as nothing personal; after all, deceit, betrayal, and war are part and parcel of a ruler’s job.

But he’d be lying if he said it didn’t sting.

He stretches his arms over his head, exhaling slowly through pursed lips. “I guess I have a lot to think about tonight. I appreciate you coming all the way to my room at this hour just to tell me, Teach - but why _ are _you telling me?”

“Edelgard’s army arrives here in a matter of days. I thought that if we died from disagreeing with her, we would die as a matter of circumstance. As soldiers. I didn’t think she would be so cold-blooded as to have ordered your _ murders _beforehand to make her way easier.”

Claude hears what she isn’t saying. “You hoped that if we met Edelgard on the battlefield, she wouldn’t kill me. That she would spare me for the sake of the friendship we forged this past year.”

She shrugs. “Maybe more for your political value. If I failed to protect Garreg Mach, I thought at least I could count on you surviving as her hostage. Even in the Holy Tomb, I thought she had only fought so aggressively because we had her backed into a corner. I would have kept on thinking so, if I hadn’t heard the report about Kostas today.”

Gloriana sighs. “I apologise. You must think me so naive.”

“Not at all. The House Leaders and I, we aren’t close...we can’t really be, because of who we’re going to become. But even I wouldn’t have put assassination at the top of the list of things to fear from Edelgard.” He rumples the back of his hair thoughtfully. “Then again, I wouldn’t have put this Flame Emperor nonsense anywhere on that list either.”

“I just find the Flame Emperor difficult to reconcile with the exceptional young girl I thought I knew,” Gloriana’s voice softens, and Claude knows that, beyond the report on his safety, this is what she wants to talk about that couldn’t wait until morning. He stands closer to her, wondering if this was the opportune moment to take her in his arms (although he doesn’t).

“I stood right here with her once, did you know? I was taking a late-night stroll, and she couldn’t sleep, so we stayed up talking for a bit. She didn’t tell me anything terribly important, but it touched me to think she trusted me enough to accept my company while she was in that state. And when my father died, she was one of the first to offer her condolences, and her blade if I wanted revenge. Yet she was involved with the people who killed him.”

The tears fall, bitter and fast at the mention of her father. Gloriana swipes them away angrily, and she’s silent for a long moment.

“I respected her as the future leader of the Empire, but also as a girl who always just wanted to do right by her friends. All the times we spoke in the hallways, had tea, shared meals...now I feel like perhaps I had things all wrong. I don’t know what feels worse: that Edelgard is a liar or that I had been a fool to believe her.”

“And she tried to have you killed. And she very nearly did it herself. If I hadn’t - “ She pounds on the parapet with her fist in frustration. As with all of her emotional outbursts, it’s a small movement, but Claude knows that if she allows it at all, it must be getting too much for her to handle. He closes a hand over hers. “Hey.”

Gloriana threads her fingers through his. He settles into the spaces between.

“If it helps at all, I won’t let Edelgard kill me.” And because he’s Claude, he tries to smile. “And I know you won’t let me die.”

The look Gloriana fixes on him is stony. “Be serious, Claude von Riegan. This girl deceived everyone in the monastery for the better part of a year. If our own eyes could be fooled, I’m not confident any intel can be trusted.”

He squeezes her hand. And because life’s too short, he takes his hand off hers and drapes his arm around her shoulders instead. “It’s war, Glow,” he says softly into her hair. “We can’t trust anything from anyone anymore.”

Gloriana melts against his side, wrapping her own arm around the small of his back. Her grip is tight, as if she wants to be sure he’s really, truly there. Claude has no complaints. 

“I have the stomach for war, Claude. But I don’t think I’ll ever have the stomach for betrayal.”

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this written for WEEKS and as much as I want to upload fic in this series in order, the Universe is just not on my side about it. T_T But here you go, and I hope you still stick around for more of Claude and Gloriana! <3
> 
> \----
> 
> References used:
> 
> love your enemy - From Sun Tzu: “It is easy to love your friend, but sometimes the hardest lesson to learn is to love your enemy.”
> 
> Innocent - off TS' Speak Now: "I guess you really did it this time, left yourself in your warpath."


End file.
